sooner or later the superstructure must fall. And, truly, if his reasonings
are legitimate, and his conclusions just, "Science has laid the axe to the
tree."


"Given a set of marks which we look upon in human productions as unfailing
indications of design," he asks, "is not the inference equally legitimate
when we recognize these marks in Nature? To gaze on such a universe as
this, to feel our hearts exult within us in the fullness of existence, and
to offer in explanation of such beneficent provision no other word but
Chance, seems as unthankful and iniquitous as it seems absurd. Chance
produces nothing in the human sphere; nothing, at least, that can be relied
upon for good. Design alone engenders harmony, consistency; and Chance not
only never is the parent, but is constantly the enemy of these. How, then,
can we suppose Chance to be the author of a system in which everything is
as regular as clockwork? . . . The hypothesis of Chance is inadmissible."


There is, then, in Nature, an order; and, in "P.C.W.'s" sense of the word,
a manifest purpose. Some sort of conception as to the cause of it is
inevitable, that of design first and foremost. "Why"--the Westminster
Reviewer repeats the question--"why, if the marks of utility and adaptation
are conclusive in the works of man, should they not be considered equally
conclusive in the works of Nature?" His answer appears to us more ingenious
than sound. Because, referring to Paley's watch,--


"The watch-finder is not guided solely in his inference by marks of
adaptation and utility; he would recognize design in half a watch, in a
mere fragment of a watch, just as surely as in a whole time-keeper . . .